Mobi

Ah, Apple rumour time. It’s almost always Apple rumour time these days, what with Apple having so many products and services undergoing constant wizardry and revolution, with new photos now potentially revealing Apple’s first iPhone 4 “World” phone that would theoretically work with all the world’s major mobile networks and break AT&T’s iron-grip of exclusivity in the US. While Steve Jobs may have iBliterated any notion that Apple will produce a 7-inch iPad anytime soon, there was no word on whether a CDMA-based iPhone 4 would be making an appearance in the near future.

As we know, Steve Jobs isn’t in the habit of pre-announcing products with any kind of regularity and said as much a couple of times in answer to analyst questions, but given the ongoing rumours about Verizon finally getting to join the iPhone party on its superior network, this one seems a lot more likely to happen, probably by early next year as the rumours suggest.

What’s the latest piece of news doing the rounds to support Verizon’s iPhone 4 rumourology?

It comes from blogger Richy Rich, who posted an “exclusive” featuring what he claims are “Verizon iPhone 4 photos”.

Rich noted the Boy Genius report which suggested the Verizon/CDMA iPhone 4 could come as both a CDMA and 3G/GSM device, thus turning it into a “world phone”, working on almost all of the world’s major mobile networks and giving more choice in some countries, primarily the US, over which network would be used – especially if the phone was available in a fully unlocked edition.

Rich says he’s “happy to report a follow up to that post with live shots of an “N92DVT” device, which was reported to be the CDMA version of the iPhone 4 back in August by John Gruber.”

Rich adds some mystique to the proceedings by suggested that: to his knowledge, “these shots originated from a repair shop in Vietnam, and according to the “DVT” (Design Verification Test) label, it is in final testing stages before production.”

The Vietnamese shop owners, who presumably have excellent contacts within the iPhone 4 manufacturing plans, or who have excellent contacts with excellent contacts, say that there is indeed a micro-SIM slot on the iPhone 4, but as “the device is no longer in my sources possession, therefore I wasn’t able to obtain photos for proof.” Although it does dovetail nicely with Boy Genius’ report, the slot might just be there because it’s not a final production unit, or perhaps because Apple intends to deploy such capabilities in a future iPhone 5.

Rich’s photos also purport to show a “test operating system” similar to a previous one called “Inferno” from previous “iPhone 4 beta test images and video”.

So… it’s all either yet another elaborate hoax… or underground confirmation (or leakage) of Apple’s secret plans, whether to cause mischief or to unofficially alert the world to the imminent arrival of the iPhone 4 to stave off any as-yet unmade Android or WP7 purchasing decisions.

It also makes me wonder… will Apple launch a CDMA iPhone 4 in January 2011, only to follow it up with a non-CDMA iPhone 5 just only three or four months later?

Or is the CDMA iPhone 4 going to make a surprise 2010 pre-Christmas appearance so there’s still plenty of time between the iPhone 4 and the iPhone 5 going out the door?

A final thought – how soon before an LTE iPhone makes an appearance, could it come with the iPhone 5, or will LTE-lovers have to wait until the iPhone 6 to get their kicks?